A Longtime Christmas Tradition
Is Threatened by Anthrax Scare

By

Rick Brooks Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

Updated Nov. 8, 2001 12:01 a.m. ET

For the past 33 years, almost every letter to Santa Claus mailed to the tiny town of Christmas, Fla. (population 1,162), has wound up on the dining-room table of Jack James, a retired space-shuttle operations analyst whose white beard sometimes leads him to be mistaken for you-know-who.

At least six hours a day from Thanksgiving to Christmas, Mr. James rips open the letters, reads each one with his wife, Alice, and then answers with a...